Final Payment Stress Credit Card Issue

Thought I would share some info, maybe just be limited to Canadians or even just people with a CIBC Credit Card.

At 2am around the time our final payment was due I got an email to say our card was declined, it does explain in the email that it could be an "out of country" issue, I also got a credit alert from CIBC. I called them and they asked a bunch of questions and said all would be good now.

I called Couples and they said the charge would be auto tried again, I also replied to the email they had sent.

Again 2am, same thing, declined, I actually got out of bed this time and called CIBC at 2am, after many questions again, they once again said all was good, although that could have been my anger and frustration at them that they where putting by 2 weeks vacation in jeopardy as I knew CN was full one of the weeks we are there.

I called the reservations manager and told her of what was going on and she assured me all was going to be ok and the auto 2am payment would go through. Although she sensed my frustration of waiting until 2am and processed the payment right away and all was good. Another example of the great customer service from Couples I keep hearing about.

So lesson... if you are paying a final payment, make sure your CC company knows, call them a few days before, maybe not be an issue for your bank, but CIBC in Canada seems to very tight on this, so if you have a CIBC credit, I would for sure call.

You bring up a good point. Sometimes a credit card company in the states or Canada, will refuse the payment as you have found out, just because it is out of the country. You can fix that by calling them before your trip and letting them know that you will be going and charges from Jamaica will be okay. We have one card that we only use in Jamaica and that has solved the problem se too used to have.

Same thing happened to us. It was a President's Choice MasterCard, which is also CIBC. I always make sure to inform the credit card companies before we go, so the cards won't be declined while we're in Jamaica, but I never thought about it happening at home.

thanks for the heads up....this is good to know because I have a final payment being charged to my card next month for our vacation at Couples....I will definitely alert my bank because they are very tight on issues like this too..I made a purchase for some items at JCPenney, and because I had not purchased from them in over a year, they declined my recent purchase, until they confirmed that it was me...good customer service on their part as well.

Exactly Mary, I had a note to call CIBC before we left, have to do that with my corporate visa with RBC when I travel to the states, never crossed my mind that it would happen just paying the bill. Lesson learned.

Our friends are having a similar issue with their CIBC credit card but they are being told by the resort that their address doesn't match...they are totally stressed because we are all going together and have been looking forward to this trip for so long>>>